I don't know all that much about Tolkien (he didn't write a book about himself, the way Lewis did, that I know of), but I know that C. S. Lewis absolutely loved the old Scandinavian/Norse legends and mythologies.

Emma_85 wrote:That whole poem is full of other names (especially Dwarf ones), which Tolkien used. It's great to see where he got his ideas and names from .

Yes, you can see many of the dwarf names in "The Hobbit". In another site that provides the English translation of the Poetic Edda, Gandalf is said to mean a "magical elf(dwarf)" and somewhere else it is said to be "staff(wand?) elf"(elf and dwarf are used interchangeably).

Here is a bunch of links and resources. There is a link to a scanned Old Icelandic dictionary. There should be a link to a new Old norse grammar book by Barnes. Gordon is great, but the more the merrier. You can't really order it through amazon, but amazon UK has it. You have to actually order it through this university if you live in the US: http://www.asu.edu/clas/acmrs/mrts/

Don't bother trying to find it in that website you have to email them and ask for it. And a pretty good price too! This was part of the reply that I got:

Yes, we have it, and for $15 plus $3 shipping I can let you have a copy. Interested? BTW, there are two other volumes, and if you want all three I can sell them to you at a discount for $30 plus $7 shipping. No smeghead should be without them (I have two sets in fact).